Hong Kong: 1,000+ Cadavers in Cold Storage After Virus Deaths Surge

Hong Kong health officials confirmed this week that 1,100 cadavers remained in municipal cold storage facilities unclaimed because local funeral parlors have failed to keep up with the surging demand for funerals caused by Hong Kong’s latest epidemic of the Chinese coronavirus, the Hong Kong Free Press (HKFP) reported on Friday.

The HKFP cited an April 20 press release by the Hong Kong Department of Health which urged members of the city’s public to claim bodies from local morgues.

“As of today, about 1 100 bodies are still stored at DH [Department of Health] facilities after completion of the relevant procedures. The DH appealed to the next of kin to claim the bodies of their deceased family members to make funeral arrangements as soon as possible,” the notice read.

The health department claimed that the overabundance of corpses at city morgues in recent days was a direct result of a spike in Chinese coronavirus-related deaths during Hong Kong’s latest wave of the disease, specifically during a time period from late February to early March.

Continuing, the statement read:

To handle the sudden surge of deceased bodies during the epidemic and to address public demand to claim back bodies as soon as possible, relevant government departments have proactively co-ordinated to increase the capacity of body storage facilities and the number of body identification that could be conducted daily so as to address public concern and to enable families of deceased persons to handle after-death arrangements promptly.

The Hong Kong Department of Health said it had successfully processed and released to funeral parlors 1,800 cadavers from March to early April but still had 1,100 bodies lying unclaimed across municipal morgues.

Kwok Hoi-pong, the chairman of Hong Kong’s Funeral Business Association, told an RTHK radio show on April 22 that funeral parlors city-wide were “already running at capacity,” describing them as “overloaded.”

Kwok predicted that relevant businesses “would take two to three weeks to handle the [1,100] unclaimed bodies” referred to by the Hong Kong Department of Health on April 20.

“Many families have already made reservations at funeral parlours … funeral services are already booked out to mid May, some until the end of May,” Kwok told RTHK on Friday. “Therefore, for the moment, most families are temporarily leaving the bodies in refrigerated units.”

Hong Kong’s latest wave of the Chinese coronavirus has reportedly caused a high number of deaths among the city’s elderly population. The epidemic there has proven persistent, first sparking in late 2021.

“A total of 1,188,277 people have contracted the [Chinese corona]virus since the onset of the fifth wave of the epidemic, involving 9,014 deaths,” Hong Kong’s government said in a press release issued on April 22.

An unnamed Hong Kong funeral industry representative told local media on March 16 that the city’s funeral homes were running out of coffins due to the high coronavirus death rate.

“[T]he soaring death toll had seen a crunch in the city’s coffins supply, with only 300 remaining and expected to be gone by the weekend,” Agence France-Presse (AFP) quoted the anonymous source as saying at the time.

Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam confirmed the coffin shortage on March 16. Asked about the matter at a regular press briefing, Lam said her administration expected China to send Hong Kong “two shipments of coffins” in the coming days.

“I learned from the Food and Health Bureau last night that they are endeavoring to arrange transportation [of coffins] by water,” Lam said.